Nadeem and Utkarsh shine, Kerala’s 276 for six against Jharkhand
Jharkhand’s spin duo of Shahbaz Nadeem and Utkarsh Singh shared five wickets but Kerala managed to post 276 for six on the opening day of their Ranji Trophy cricket Group C match here on Tuesday. Left-arm spinner Nadeem (3/108) took three wickets including Sanju Samson (72) and Rohan Kunnumal (50). Off-spinner Utkarsh also took two wickets for 43 runs. He sent Rohan Prem (79) to the pavilion. Kunnumal, who recently made it to the India A team, got the team off to a good start by putting on 90 runs for the first wicket with Rohan Prem.
At the end of the day’s play, Akshay Chandran was playing on 39 while Sijomon Joseph was playing on 28 runs. Both have made an unbroken partnership of 51 runs so far. In Bengaluru, Karnataka were in trouble at 148 for six against Services in 40 overs despite a 62-run knock from Nikin Jose. For Army, Divesh Pathania took five wickets for 40 runs. In Puducherry, the hosts bowled out Chhattisgarh for 162 thanks to Sagar Udeshi (4/36) and Ankit Sharma (4/78).
Shahnawaz Hussain scored the maximum 43 runs from Chhattisgarh. In response, Puducherry did not start well and lost two wickets for 17 runs in nine overs. Both wickets went to Ajay Mandal’s account. In another Group CK match at Porvorim, Goa posted half-centuries from Suyash Prabhudesai (81 not out) and Snehal Kauthankar (59) to post 210 for five. Aniket Chowdhary took two wickets for 37 runs.
